Sexual Harassment is a Hard Art production directed by Sally Forth with a cast that includes Niki Snow, Robby Echo, and James Bartholet.

The story is a long-standing Hollywood tale of a search for stardom. Lucille Le Seur, (Niki Snow) leaves her Iowa hometown to head for Tinseltown and a career in film. Roles are hard to come by, of course, and Lucille turns to porn to pay the rent.

Much of Sexual Harassment is a throwback to the old days of porn when good shooting was at a minimum. In the sex scenes, the soundtrack often does not match the performers' lip movements and the background music is looped. Pretty amateurish by today's standards and that is the point.

By the way, the fifth sex scene is the best of the film and highlights the journey adult shooters have taken into modern times. It's a three-way between Allessa Von Camp, Brad Sterling, and Niki Snow who appears as the French Maid, another porn trope. Bodies are shown in their entirety with an emphasis on pleasure.

Sexual Harassment mixes its porn time periods with tongue firmly planted in cheek. When Lucille is looking for work, she checks the back-page ads of a local tabloid and we later see a cordless phone circa last century.

With her porn success in place, a crossing over opportunity knocks for Lucille and she takes a shot at B picture fame in another Hollywood standby, the horror-gore flick. We get a quick glance at the feature performer, the "Chainsaw Man," who plows through his cameo moment wearing a mask. There's some history there that dates to 1974, the second year of the Porno Chic era.

Perhaps the mask also references the old stag days when men wearing only black socks concealed their identities.

Finally, Lucille makes an impression on Hollywood mogul, Herb Weinstein (James Bartholet) who interviews a new intern (Destiny Lovee) right before Lucille enters his office. He tells Destiny, "If you want to get ahead, you have to give some head... suck like your career depends on it." Not exactly original dialogue, but it fills the bill nicely. Herb pops on a photo of Lucille who is next on his harassment list.

As you might expect, the film offers up a Harvey Weinstein ending. From that perspective, Sexual Harassment is imbued with female empowerment. Lucille is in control of her career from the very start and that in itself is a welcome update on Porn Valley's checkered past.

Sexual Harassment is cleverly written with a comedic touch. The action is well-paced and the performers clearly have fun.

For example, when Lucille shows up for her test stills, the photographer (AINews editor Steve Nelson) offers an amusing line when he pulls down her top and lifts her skirt. Lucille is caught off guard so to ease her mood, she's told, "skin's good, skin's good . . . it's all over your body."

By the way, for the viewer who might miss the importance of Lucille Le Seur, allow me to fill you in.

You see, in 1920s Hollywood a young woman by that name became a star in silent film. When talkies arrived, she forged a legendary career winning an Oscar in 1947.

But the rumor persisted that this real-life Lucille once shot stags, the earliest of porn films. Nothing was ever verified but the story always hung over her. As you might guess, her sleeping around honed her reputation for a prolific sexual appetite. Thus, she was "hell in bed," just as director Sally Forth informs us when she gives the porn name, "Helen Bedd," to her version of Lucille.

But the good folks at Hard Art have got to clean up their print editing. The cast is overly large and this may have led to sloppiness in post-production. Some names are misspelled and others are left out. Remember, directors, cinematographers, and performers consider adult film to be their art. Let's not short change them.

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